Poems into Print

Course Description

Summary

Poetry is as much a visual medium as it is a sonic one. What do we learn about the process of composing poems by experimenting closely with their visual aspects? How does working simultaneously with both text and image impact the creative process? What happens when writers break out of the Google doc and engage with the physical process of setting letters on the page? What happens when visual artists start with text as a point of departure for making their work?

This is a course for poetry and visual art students, in which you will be writing and reading poems as well as learning how to arrange, lay out and print that work intentionally, in order to bring out (or explode!) their meanings. We will be working in an atmosphere of spontaneity, experimentation, and creative fusion, within the constraints of the letterpress process. In addition to learning the rigors of printing anything in a letterpress process, you will be writing and reading poems, with special attention paid to work that employs constraint to make bold visual moves. Collectively, we will work toward a final group project/presentation.